


Burned

by HeadLadyInquisitor



Category: Mass Effect: Andromeda
Genre: Alcohol, Angst, F/M, Introspection, Post-Break Up, Post-High Noon, Short, Spoilers, Whiskey - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-14
Updated: 2017-06-14
Packaged: 2018-11-14 04:48:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 814
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11200761
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HeadLadyInquisitor/pseuds/HeadLadyInquisitor
Summary: The view is the same, but the whiskey is cheap and the company is... lacking.





	Burned

The crates hadn't been moved in weeks - probably empty - and Reyes could feel them lingering above his head every time he walked through the port. But, until now, he hadn't so much as looked at them since...

He tipped the bottle back against his lips, relishing the way it burned down his throat. It was cheap - certainly no Mount Milgrom. But then, he supposed he'd never taste that again. Probably for the best, since it would only bring him right back to the last time he sat here, sharing the fine liquor with a pair of soft lips. He winced at the cliché, but it had tasted even better on her tongue.

Reyes had been hurt before, even heartbroken, and his preferred method for coping had always been to throw himself into work until the pain faded into the background, distant and forgotten. He'd been told more than once that it was unhealthy, but it worked, so what did he care?

Until now, anyway.

It filled him in the early hours of the morning, a searing, suffocating ache in his chest, just when he finally thought himself exhausted enough to get some sleep. He closed his eyes and she was walking away from him all over again. Always, always, always walking away. It was as if he’d lost the right to even picture her face.

No, ignoring it wasn't working this time, so maybe it was time to try what Keema had been telling him. _'Let yourself mourn, Reyes,'_ she'd urged, worry swimming in those wide eyes of hers. _'She meant a great deal to you. You're allowed to be sad.'_

 _'Easy for her to say,'_  he mused with another long pull - the bottle was half gone by now, and he wasn't sure how long he'd been sitting on the crates. This ‘feelings’ business came so naturally to the angara. Years of burying things didn't come undone in one night, but he had no choice but to try. She was gone, and, as far as he could tell, she wasn't coming back. Correspondence had been nothing but professional - even so, he thought he detected a hint of her natural warmth underlying her words. Wishful thinking, probably. Or maybe an attempt to placate him to keep her outpost safe.

Reyes swirled the bottle around thoughtfully. He hoped she knew that wasn't necessary. He'd already committed to keeping the outpost safe. It was for the sake of Kadara, but it was also because it was the only way he had left of reaching out to her. Caring for her through her work - _their_ work.

Another drink. She'd given him the port on purpose - he knew she'd seen his sniper and let Sloane fall. She'd made the split-second decision that he was the better choice for Kadara and the Initiative, but it hadn't been enough to make her stay. He thought maybe he should resent her for it - you’re supposed to be angry when someone hurts you, right? But he was hard-pressed to find a reason. He _had_ been playing her at the start, using his pretty words and wit and carefully placed breadcrumbs to draw her in, make her trust him, endear her to the Collective. But that was all he'd meant to do, not-

The bottle was three-quarters gone now. Maybe when it was empty he'd be able to finish some of these thoughts.

He fought off the part of him that said none of this mattered now - clearly it _did_ or he wouldn't be sitting here. But what was he really trying to do, other than burn the pain from his throat with cheap liquor? She was gone, she wasn't coming back, and it was his own damn fault. His cowardly lies had shattered whatever fragile thing he'd inadvertently built with her. She let him in - recklessly, maybe - and he was too selfish, too afraid to do the same. He'd greedily snatched up moments with her, kisses he didn't deserve, knowing that it would all come to an end the moment she found out who he was. And he was right.

The whiskey was gone and Reyes couldn’t remember the last twenty minutes or so, but there was something skirting the edges of his mind, like the glint off a rifle’s scope in his peripheral vision. The knowledge of why _this_ heartbreak was the one that he couldn't shut out. Before, he'd wanted to know, but now he pushed - back, back, back against it until it was buried where he could pretend it didn't exist. Because there was a part of him that knew acknowledging that particular truth would only wreck him.

He took one long, deep breath and climbed down off the crates, empty bottle dangling between his fingers. Sense told him to go straight to his tiny apartment and sleep off the booze, but instead, he made for Tartarus. _Back to work_.

**Author's Note:**

> Join me in Reyes hell! I'm head-bitch-inquisitor on tumblr.


End file.
